Peter Schorsch
It’s been a little while since Nokia has been at the bleeding edge of the tech world, but Rajeev Suri has done quite a bit to put the communications company back on the path since he took over as CEO in 2014.
In an interview with Axios, the executive talked about his 10-year plan to put the company’s quibbles with competitors to bed and restore the Finnish brand’s name – and product lineup – to a place of prominence.
One of Suri’s major accomplishments this year was settling a years-long patent dispute with Apple, one of the companies that took the torch from Nokia in the cell phone market a decade ago.
That settlement ended up not only with Nokia receiving some up-front cash and ongoing payments, but was ended amicably enough that the two businesses are sitting at the same table when comes to forging new tech in digital health market.
What was once a legal headache is “now a collaboration,” Suri said. “We meet regularly and want to expand that.” The 49-year-old CEO can even be seen sporting an iPhone, which Suri pointed out is “just evidence of how well the relationship with Apple is going.”
Phones of course are what brought the Nokia name into homes worldwide, and for good reason. In their heyday, the devices – often compared to bricks aesthetically, but also for their unmatched durability – were considered some of the most reliable and high-quality pieces of kit consumers could get their hands on.
While the company isn’t diving head first back into the handset market, the brand name has been licensed out as part of a multi-year deal with fellow Finland-based company HMD Global.
That deal also brings in some cash for the company as it focuses on its modern goals of expanding its networking business and building new solutions in the virtual reality and health care markets.
And those goals are being reached.
In the past few years, Nokia has acquired and integrated the carrier networking businesses of Motorola, Siemens and Alcatel-Lucent and has been steadily climbing the ranks to become one of the top comms equipment providers for companies and government agencies everyone relies on – even Florida’s law enforcement communications network is built with Nokia products and technology.
Their network is also one of the strongest out there. According worldwide rankings from the Dell’Oro Group, Nokia ranks No. 2 in 4G/LTE, No. 1 in packet microwave radio systems, No. 2 in IP Edge Routing, No. 1 in copper broadband access and No. 2 in fiber access.
Even though consumers don’t see those iconic block letters above their phone’s earpiece nowadays, with Suri at the helm the communications world is starting to depend on Nokia as much as consumers depended on those lovable bricks a decade ago.
